


Frayed

by embroiderama



Series: Golden Braid [4]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Established Relationship, Makeup Sex, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 22:20:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/918689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embroiderama/pseuds/embroiderama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal's not the only person in the relationship with baggage, and a secret and a misunderstanding leave El thinking the worst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Frayed

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the world of [The Golden Braid](http://embroiderama.livejournal.com/486696.html), but all you really need to know is that Neal gets together with Peter and El in a world where threesomes are the norm. I wrote this for [](http://elrhiarhodan.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://elrhiarhodan.livejournal.com/)**elrhiarhodan** 's prompt in my timestamp meme.

El sat in her car with her face in her hands, trying desperately to unsee what she'd just witnessed in her office. Neal, who had no particular reason that she could think of to be visiting her office that day, had been talking to her new assistant Jessica. More than talking--he'd been so close to her he was practically in her lap. El hadn't been able to hear any of whatever they were whispering to each other, but the fact that they'd all but leapt apart when they noticed her in the doorway was damning evidence. She didn't want to believe that Neal would be cheating on her and Peter--or even flirting with the possibility of cheating--but she had to believe her own eyes.

Jessica was blonde and willowy and 27 years old, and she and her girlfriend were looking for a male partner. Neal said that he loved her and Peter, that he trusted them, but maybe he'd just been too badly burned by his previous relationship to ever truly trust a man and woman again. El just didn't know what to do. Her first instinct was to call Peter and share her suspicions, but then she thought that if she did go to Peter and if the two of them then confronted Neal as a unit that would only confirm Neal's fears. And what if she was wrong, she could ruin everything and hurt Neal worse all because she was jealous. No, she couldn't run to Peter.

Her next thought was to go back in the office to see what was going on and then just ask Neal but she couldn't take the thought of being at work when she heard from Neal that he had betrayed them or wanted to leave them. It was all too awful, especially considering that everything was supposed to be great. They'd been in the new house for a few weeks, and she thought-- _had_ thought--that Neal liked it there. She hadn't thought of him as a guest at the old house, but she loved seeing the little things that changed now that they were in a new place that was officially his home too.

He was spreading out, letting his things be scattered through the house, intermingled with hers and Peters. He sang to himself when it was his turn to do the dishes, and he spent a lot more time wearing a lot fewer layers of clothing. El had been looking forward to decades of learning to love Neal's quirks the way she did Peter's, but now it all felt like a terrible tease.

El took a deep breath and told herself that whatever had happened between Neal and Jessica, the world wasn't ending. Maybe she had misunderstood, maybe the small, beautiful wedding they were supposed to have in a few months would still happen, maybe she wasn't going to be left with two-thirds of a marriage and two broken hearts. She had a client meeting to get to, so she fixed her makeup in the rearview mirror and pushed her suspicions and her fears into a box to be dealt with later.

~~~

El arrived home before Peter or Neal, and she told herself not to stew, not to dwell on the worst case scenarios before she talked to Neal, but it wasn't easy. She fed Satchmo and thought about putting something together for dinner but she was too tense to decide on anything. She was standing in the living room studying a framed photo of the three of them when she heard the door open and then close.

"Hi, El!" Neal said, sounding sweet and charming as always. "I was hoping to beat you home, but I got held up at work."

El didn't turn around, and she heard footsteps behind her then felt the light touch of Neal's lips on her neck, his arms curving around her. She couldn't take the gentle touch when she was so uncertain about their future, and she couldn't help pulling away.

"El? What's wrong?"

She turned around to look at him, and she didn't know if she should trust the look of innocent confusion on his face. "What held you up?"

"Just work. One of our biggest accounts had a problem, and Mozzie isn't always the best at soothing the savage purchasing director so I had to smooth it over."

El wanted to believe him, but she didn't want to be a fool. She didn't want to be the woman who had accepted the easy lies. "I have to know, why were you at my office? With my assistant?"

Neal's eyes widened, and a look of panic flashed across his face. "It was nothing. I just stopped by."

El felt tears burning behind her eyes, and she pressed her lips together hard for a moment before she spoke. "If you want to be with her, then go. Just don't lie, don't lie to me or to Peter."

" _What?_ Elizabeth, no! It wasn't anything like that."

"I know what I saw."

"I don't think you do. Please." He sounded convincingly horrified, but El didn't think she could believe him.

In that moment, Peter walked in the door and started to greet them both then went silent, looking back and forth between them. "What happened?"

"It's a misunderstanding," Neal said quickly. "El saw me talking to her assistant."

Peter sighed. "I'm sorry, hon. It was my idea. We didn't want you to know yet."

El felt a new rush of devastation burning through her chest. "It was your idea? But--"

"No! El, it was seriously not what you're thinking."

"Hon." Peter walked closer and touched her arm but she pulled away. "I know that you always want to put together parties for other people, but we want you to be the guest of honor this time without having to do the work yourself. Jessica agreed to help us, but--"

El shook her head. "What are you talking about? A party?"

Peter looked confused. "What else would we be talking about?"

"I would never cheat on you and Peter," Neal said, his voice rough. "Never. I can't believe you think I would." Neal turned around and went to look out the window, and Peter stared at El then at Neal and back at El.

"Hon, no. We were planning a birthday party. For you."

"Oh my god." It made sense, and all El forced herself to turn away from the understanding in Peter's face to look at the tense lines of Neal's back. "Neal, I'm so sorry."

"I'm sorry that you think I could be that cruel." He didn't turn around, just spoke the words to the window.

"I didn't think you were trying to be cruel. I thought maybe you would be happier or more comfortable with two women or with younger partners. Maybe you didn't know how to tell us we reminded you too much of--of your last relationship."

Neal did turn around then, and his eyes were dry but the pain in them was clear. "Neither of you is anything like either of them," he said firmly. "And I've never been happier than I have been here in our house. But you think I'm so--so damaged that I can't be trusted?"

"No," Peter said, his voice low and steady.

"No," El echoed. "Or I didn't until I saw what I thought I saw, and then I was trying to make sense of it." She took a step toward Neal then stopped when it looked like he was going to bolt. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart."

Peter touched her arm and she looked up to see a small, reassuring smile. Peter raised his eyebrows in question, and she nodded her answer then watched as Peter slowly walked over to Neal and pulled him into his arms. After a minute she saw the taut energy of Neal's body relax into Peter, and as Peter began to speak quietly into Neal's ear she walked away.

El had reasons for jumping to conclusions, her own damage that was rearing its ugly head, and she didn't want to talk about it but she hoped that hearing it would help Neal forgive her. Peter would explain, but El couldn't stand there listening to the whispers. She walked out through the back door and stood on their little deck looking at the mosaic table Neal had created, all the little pieces of broken glass coming together to make something beautiful.

The screen door opened and closed behind her, and Neal's hands came to rest tentatively on her shoulders. She leaned back into his touch, and the weight of his head leaned into hers. He inhaled deeply and exhaled on a sigh, a gust of breath through her hair. He stroked his hands down her arms, and she turned to face him, stretching up for a kiss. Neal's strong, delicate hands held her close as he kissed her deeply and thoroughly, kisses that said _I'm here, I'm not going anywhere_ , kisses that tasted like forgiveness.

But the words were needed, too. She pulled back to look in his eyes and said, "I'm sorry."

Neal nodded slowly. "I'm sorry, too. I should have thought about how it might look to you. For the record though, Jessica is very pretty but she's not my type."

El rested her head on Neal's chest and listened as the screen door opened and closed again. Peter walked around behind her and joined their embrace, the wall of his body pressing her tightly against Neal. Peter's arms reached around, holding them all in a circle of warmth, and El knew that the crisis was over, they would be okay.

Eventually they pulled apart from each other and moved back inside the house, but they all kept within arms length as much as they could. They put together a simple dinner, all three of them working in the kitchen. Peter heated up some soup, El layered cheese on thick slices of bread and put them in the oven to quickly toast, and Neal made a salad. They ate then moved to the living room to relax, but it was a short, quiet evening, all of them exhausted by the drama of the day.

Guilt was working its way into El's head again, mostly from the memory of Neal's face, the hurt look as if she'd slapped him. Worse. She pulled a sleep shirt out of  
her dresser and was thinking about taking herself off to the guest room for the night when Neal walked over and leaned against the edge of the dresser right in front of her. He was shirtless and barefoot, his hair mussed from undressing.

"So, once upon a time, you mentioned something about make-up sex." There was a touch of shyness in Neal's face, but there was boldness, too. When she didn't say anything he continued, "You know, back when I made some assumptions and almost threw this whole relationship away, when you and Peter came and showed me how wrong I was. In fact, I think you mentioned _great_ make-up sex."

With those words, El knew she wasn't going to the guest room. "I do remember that," she said, reaching out to tug at the front of Neal's jeans. "And I think it sounds like a wonderful idea."

Neal reach out and flicked open the front clasp of El's bra while she unbuttoned his jeans and shoved them down his hips. He pushed her bra aside and cupped his hands around her breasts as if to replace that support, and El leaned into his touch for a moment, but she needed more. She shifted away to shed the bra from her shoulders and step out of her panties while Neal kicked off his pants, and without Neal blocking her view she could see Peter on the bed, naked and waiting for them.

As El nudged Neal onto the bed and climbed up to straddle his hips she shook her hair out around her shoulders and leaned over to meet Peter for a kiss. She knew in that moment that nobody could take this away from her, nobody but herself, and the men who loved her weren't going to let that happen. As she rose up and sank down on Neal she let her fears go. She let everything go.


End file.
